Chevron CEO takes on critics in annual meeting

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SAN RAMON, Calif. - Still battling a $19 billion pollution lawsuit in Ecuador, Chevron Corp. CEO John Watson faced down critics Wednesday at the oil giant's annual shareholders meeting, insisting his company would soon be vindicated.

He brushed aside demands he be fired for his handling of the lawsuit, which seeks to hold Chevron liable for poisoning the soil and water in a swath of the Amazon rain forest.

When an Ecuadorean farmer said oil field contamination killed his parents, Watson told the man that he had been misled by lawyers eager to make money at Chevron's expense. When the head of an environmental group questioned Watson's own actions in the case and kept speaking past her allotted time, Watson had her ejected from the room.

His defense of Chevron drew applause from shareholders gathered at the company's headquarters, even as it infuriated protesters outside the campus gates.

"We have to complete the legal work, but certainly we've won in the court of public opinion on this case," Watson told reporters after the meeting. "We've certainly won with our shareholders on this case. And I'm hoping we can bring the legal part of it to a close."

The Ecuador lawsuit has cast a shadow over Chevron's meetings for nearly a decade, even as Chevron's profits, stock price and dividends have soared.

Year after year, environmental groups and activist investors have used the meetings to urge Chevron to settle the case. Chevron has refused, calling the lawsuit extortion. The tension only increased after an Ecuadorean court in 2011 ruled against the company, slapping Chevron with penalties that have now grown to $19 billion. Rather than pay, Chevron sued the opposing team's lawyers for racketeering, arguing that they made up evidence.

At this year's meeting, Chevron's critics targeted Watson himself.

Servio Curipoma, a cacao farmer from San Carlos, Ecuador, demanded that Watson be fired. Speaking through an interpreter, he told shareholders and Chevron board members that his town remains tainted with toxins that killed his parents, who both died of stomach cancer.

"Mr. Curipoma, I'm very sorry for your loss," Watson said. "I find it very sad that the indigenous people are being used by American trial lawyers in this case."

The lawsuit was first filed against Texaco Corp., which drilled for oil in northeastern Ecuador from 1964 to 1992.Chevron became involved after it bought Texaco in 2001.